Government withholds results of pilot survey

MOFFETT FIELD, Calif. — An unprecedented national survey of pilots by the U.S. government has found that safety problems like near collisions and runway interference occur far more frequently than previously recognized. But the government is withholding the information, fearful it would upset air travelers and hurt airline profits.

NASA gathered the information under an $8.5 million federal safety project, through telephone interviews with roughly 24,000 commercial- and general-aviation pilots over nearly four years. Since shutting down the project more than a year ago, the space agency has refused to divulge its survey data publicly.

After The Associated Press disclosed details Monday about the survey and efforts to keep its results secret, NASA's chief said he will reconsider how much of the survey findings can be made public.

"NASA should focus on how we can provide information to the public, not on how we can withhold it," NASA Administrator Michael Griffin said in a statement.

Last week, NASA ordered the contractor that conducted the survey to purge all related data from its computers. Congress on Monday announced a formal investigation of the pilot survey and instructed NASA to halt any destruction of records. Griffin said he already was ordering that all survey data be preserved.

The AP learned about the NASA results from one person familiar with the survey who spoke on condition of anonymity because this person was not authorized to discuss the results.

A senior NASA official, associate administrator Thomas S. Luedtke, said earlier that revealing the findings could damage the public's confidence in airlines and affect airline profits.

Among other results, the pilots reported at least twice as many bird strikes, near midair collisions and runway incursions as other government monitoring systems show, according to a person familiar with the results.

The survey also revealed higher-than-expected numbers of pilots who experienced "in-close approach changes" — potentially dangerous, last-

minute instructions to alter landing plans.

In a letter Monday, Rep. Bart Gordon, D-Tenn., chairman of the House Science and Technology committee, instructed NASA to provide Congress results and background on the survey and any communications from airlines about how the data might harm them.

The survey's purpose was to develop a new way of tracking safety trends and problems the airline industry could address. The project was shelved when NASA cut its budget.

NASA said nothing it discovered in the survey warranted notifying the Federal Aviation Administration immediately and data showed improvements in some areas. Survey managers occasionally briefed the FAA.

Officials involved in the survey touted the unusually high response rate among pilots, 80 percent, and said they believe it is more reliable than reporting systems that rely on pilots to report incidents voluntarily.

"The data is strong," said Robert Dodd, an aviation safety expert hired by NASA to manage the survey. "Our process was very meticulously designed and very thorough. It was very scientific."

Pilot interviews lasted about 30 minutes, with standardized questions about how frequently they encountered equipment problems, smoke or fire, engine failure, passenger disturbances, collisions with birds or inadequate tower communication, according to documents obtained by The AP.

Pilots also were asked about last-minute changes in landing instructions, flying too close to other planes, near collisions with ground vehicles or buildings or occasions when pilots left the cockpit.

"I don't believe it's in NASA's purpose and mission statement to protect the underlying financial fortunes of the airlines," David Stempler, president of the Potomac, Md.-based Air Travelers Association, said Monday. "They're to provide safety information, and the consequences will fall where they may."